I had a LOT of water retention at first. I can't tell you about weight gain though - i stopped weighing myself. With me the bloating got under control after about 1-2weeks. I know its different for everyone tho...Hange in there, keep fighting!

thank you all so much for responding. you're all smart to not weigh, but i'm gaining poundS a day! i'm trying to increase my calories, because i have gained SO much weight on sub-maintenance levels. since ive completely stopped purging i'm gaining so fast again...i really hope its fluid this time...it was easier to accept when i was so so underweight...

I totally, totally understand what you're going through--I'm sure we all have had to experience that body shock at some point. If it helps, there are a lot of little tricks to reduce bloating like guzzling down water and taking probiotics; unfortunately, it's going to take a little bit until your metabolism settles and you start burning off calories at a more consistent rate again. However, when you do, you'll feel SO much better. Good luck!

AGH!! i really want my metabolism to work. it seems like the more water i drink, the more bloated it get! and i have been taking probiotics and digestive enzymes but still gaining several pounds a DAY and i've increased my calories but certainly not by, like 10,000 a day haha. oh god........

I know completely what you're going through. I stopped purging and I've gained water weight. This happens when I eat as well water weight gets worse and worse until it starts to diminish off. The water weight WILL go down, I have tried so many times to stop purging and once I got my body back on track my water weight decreased and weight gain? I actually started losing weight! What you gained is probably just water weight. Your water weight will go away eventually just keep trying to ignore it and distract yourself from it. Don't weigh yourself immediately. Weight about two weeks at least. Once you start having frequent bowel movements your body will be able to adjust more. I feel like a bloated balloon right now...so bloated my veins pop out! We all put our bodies through heck...it will take a bit for it to adjust and get healthy. Keep strong and keep fighting! You're not alone! Focus on getting healthy at this point.
If it makes you feel any better, the reason why I know it is water weight is because I have a special scale that can tell which what is water weight from fat. Just try not to jump on the scale...I know it's hard because I've done it too only to become even more discouraged. You can do it!

i understand you, whenever i stop purging i gain weight like crazy and i just hate it. i can't deal with that, i think that is the worst part of recovery..anyway i'm trying to stay clean and to do as much exercise as i can at least doing exercise is not as bad as bingeing and purging.

it is comforting to know that i am not the only one who has been through this. i actually have been anorexic for 15 years and only in the last year or two started purging everything. i started to "try recovery" several months ago and got edema so badly i landed in the ER twice. it freaked me out and i went back to restricting and purging and over exercising, but kept GAINING. ahhh! so now i'm 50 pounds up and everyone thinks i'm "healthy" and i feel so incredibly horrible. i know i had to gain the weight, but i thought i'd have to eat a lot and work for it. so this is bad. i'm currently on a "metabolic repair" mission...trying to eat enough calories to really restore my metabolism. but i'm gaining even more rapidly, pounds a day, hoping it really is just fluid retention and will go away...it's supposed to take 3500 to gain one single pound, but throughout this "pseudo recovery" i've gained WAY more on WAY less and all the weight's been real, not water. so i really hope whats going on for now is fluid, and now that i'm not giving into disordered behaviors and have my calories up, my metabolism might actually rebound...
thank you for giving me hope!
themilady...i know what you're going through. keep fighting the urge to purge because its just gonna screw your confused body up even more. i'm trying to decrease my obsessive exercising too (it seems to make me gain even FASTER...and NOT because of muscle), so that maybe my body will finally get out of starvation mode and i'll have a metabolism again...
good luck all xo

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